Crewe in Focus: Fire Safety and Compliance
Crewe is the largest town in Cheshire East, with a population of around 75,000 and a commercial and industrial character shaped by its long history as a railway engineering centre. The town's built environment includes a mixture of Victorian and Edwardian terraced housing in close proximity to the town centre, a substantial retail and hospitality sector, light industrial and logistics premises across the eastern and southern fringes of the town, and a range of community, educational and healthcare facilities serving the wider borough. The proximity of residential streets to commercial and industrial premises — a product of the town's nineteenth-century layout — is a feature of Crewe's fire risk environment that has consequences when things go wrong, as demonstrated most starkly by the printworks fire of August 2024.
For those who own, manage or occupy non-domestic premises in Crewe, the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005 places a direct legal duty to carry out a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment and to keep it under regular review. That duty falls on the responsible person — whether the employer, managing agent, landlord or building owner — and it applies across almost every non-domestic premises in the town, from the smallest independent retailer on the high street to the largest logistics operator on the edge of town.
Communisis Printworks Arson, Catherine Street and Frances Street — August 2024
At 4:15pm on 9 August 2024, a fire broke out at the former Communisis printworks on the corner of Catherine Street and Frances Street, Crewe — a large, derelict industrial building in the heart of a residential neighbourhood. Within an hour and fifteen minutes of the alarm being raised, Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service had declared a major incident. At peak, eighteen appliances attended, drawn from stations across Cheshire and including mutual aid from Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service and West Midlands Fire and Rescue Service, along with an aerial ladder platform, a High Reach Extending Turret Scorpion from Macclesfield, a high volume pump and the command unit from Northwich. Firefighters were on scene continuously for several days.
More than 350 residents were displaced from five surrounding streets — Frances Street, Wood Street, Chamber Street, Edward Street and Catherine Street — some of whom could not return for several days. Several neighbouring properties sustained structural damage. A local leisure centre and Crewe Alexandra FC's ground were opened as rest centres for those unable to go home. Asbestos-containing materials were disturbed during the fire and building collapse, requiring Cheshire East Council to undertake a public survey and removal programme in the surrounding streets in the days that followed.
The cause is known with certainty. Two men — James Evans, aged 19, and Justin Keeling, aged 18 — entered the vacant building that afternoon and deliberately ignited a large pile of cardboard inside. Keeling filmed the early stages of the fire on his mobile phone, footage which was later discovered by police on his seized device during the investigation. Both pleaded guilty to arson being reckless as to whether life was endangered. At Chester Crown Court on 21 May 2025, Evans was sentenced to 56 months in prison and Keeling to 52 months for arson, together with a further 238 days consecutively for perverting the course of justice after he gave police a false account of seeing other suspects at the scene.
One detail from the fire service's account of the incident is particularly significant for fire safety purposes. Station manager Andy Hallworth, speaking to the BBC after the sentencing, noted that the local Crewe crews were unavailable when the call came in — they were on a training exercise — meaning the first appliances to arrive were from outside the area and were unfamiliar with the street layout in the compact terraced neighbourhood surrounding the building. The fire "grew so quickly", he said, that crews "really had to find different access points to stop it spreading to the adjacent houses." The fire service described the "frustration" of discovering the fire was deliberately started, not least because it tied up fire, police and ambulance crews for an extended period, affecting their availability to respond to other incidents across the area.
Footage from Poynton Fire Station, one of the crews that attended the Crewe printworks fire, August 2024. Video: Poynton Fire Station.
What responsible persons should take from this: The Crewe printworks fire involved a vacant building — one whose responsible person, in the conventional sense, was unclear given that the former occupier had entered administration and the building was pending demolition. But the consequences fell on the surrounding community: 350 displaced residents, several damaged homes, days of emergency service resources committed, and an asbestos recovery programme across multiple streets. For responsible persons managing premises adjacent to, or in the same terrace or block as, vacant or derelict buildings, the arson risk posed by those buildings is a foreseeable external hazard that should be considered in the fire risk assessment. For those managing vacant properties themselves, the FSO's obligations do not end when a building is emptied — they shift to whoever retains control, and the fire risk of an empty, accessible, combustible building is typically higher than when it was occupied. We have written at length about the implications of this fire for responsible persons managing vacant premises in our dedicated article: Deliberate Arson at a Vacant Building: Lessons from the Crewe Printworks Fire.
Suspected Arson at Commercial Premises, Chantry Court — February 2026
On 14 February 2026, Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service were called to a fire at the external of a commercial property on Chantry Court, Crewe, at 6:55pm. On arrival, crews found a fire on the outside of the building that was affecting the electrical and gas intakes to the property. Two firefighters wearing breathing apparatus entered the building due to evidence of the fire spreading internally, while further firefighters established a water curtain to contain the gas leak while awaiting the arrival of gas engineers to isolate the supply. Once the gas had been isolated, crews were able to fully ventilate smoke from the building. Cheshire Police also attended, as the fire was suspected to have been started deliberately.
The cause and full circumstances of this fire had not been publicly confirmed at the time of writing. What the fire service's incident record does confirm is the specific point of origin — the external of the building at the electrical and gas intakes — and the consequence of that location: a fire involving live gas and electrical infrastructure requires a significantly more complex firefighting operation than a standard structure fire, with water curtains, gas isolation, and breathing apparatus entry all deployed as part of a response to what was, in structural terms, a relatively contained external fire.
What responsible persons at commercial premises should take from this: A fire starting at the external of a building — at bin stores, plant rooms, electrical intakes, or gas meter cupboards — is one of the most common patterns in deliberately set commercial fires, and in accidental fires where combustible materials are stored against the building's exterior. The location matters because these areas are often outside the coverage of internal fire detection systems, meaning a fire can establish and begin to involve the building's structure or utility infrastructure before any alarm activates. In similar fires, the interval between ignition and the fire reaching electrical or gas systems can be very short, particularly where the intake is in an enclosed or poorly ventilated cupboard. A fire risk assessment for any commercial premises should address the management of the building's external envelope — including the control of combustible materials near the building, the security of external plant and utility enclosures, and whether the premises is adequately protected against a fire starting outside the main detection zone.
Fire Safety Duties for Responsible Persons in Crewe
Under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, any person who has control of non-domestic premises — or has a degree of control over any part of them — carries legal duties in relation to fire safety. In Crewe, that means employers and landlords across the town's retail, hospitality and commercial sectors, managing agents and building owners responsible for mixed-use and residential blocks, operators of community and healthcare facilities, and logistics and industrial operators across the town's employment areas.
A fire risk assessment is the foundation of that compliance. It must identify the fire hazards present, evaluate the risk to occupants and others who may be affected, and record the significant findings along with any remedial action required. Where five or more people are employed, or where the premises are subject to a licence, the assessment must be in writing. It must be reviewed whenever there is reason to believe it is no longer valid — following a significant change to the premises, a change of use, or where a fire or near-miss has occurred.
For premises in Crewe's town centre and surrounding residential streets, the proximity of commercial buildings to occupied housing is a material consideration in any fire risk assessment. The printworks fire demonstrated that a major fire in a commercial or industrial building can displace hundreds of residents, damage neighbouring properties, and commit emergency service resources for days. Responsible persons at commercial premises close to residential areas should ensure their assessment considers the consequences of a fire spreading beyond their site boundary — and that their evacuation plan and fire safety policy reflect those risks.
Premises with multiple occupiers or those accessible to the public should hold documented fire safety arrangements including a written evacuation plan covering all foreseeable scenarios. Where any occupants may not be able to self-evacuate, evacuation chair training for relevant staff is an increasingly expected part of a complete provision. Regular fire door inspections are essential where fire doors form part of the compartmentation strategy, and fire safety training should be provided to all staff on induction and refreshed regularly.
Fire Safety Support for Crewe and Cheshire East
Fletcher Risk Management provides fire risk assessments in Crewe and across Cheshire, alongside fire door inspections, fire safety training, evacuation plans, fire safety policies and evacuation chair training. Whether you manage a commercial premises in the town centre, an industrial or logistics unit on the edge of town, or a residential building with common areas, we can advise on your obligations and help you meet them.
If you are a managing agent or property manager responsible for the common parts of a building, our dedicated service for managing agents sets out how we work and what that process involves.
Fire safety support across the North West and North Wales
Fletcher Risk Management provides fire risk assessments, fire door inspections and fire safety training for responsible persons across Chester, Cheshire, the Wirral, Merseyside, Greater Manchester, North Wales and beyond. To discuss your requirements, please get in touch.
This article is intended for general guidance only and does not constitute legal advice. Responsible persons should seek professional advice tailored to their specific premises and circumstances. Fletcher Risk Management Ltd provides fire risk assessments, fire door inspections, and fire safety training across the North West and North Wales.